888 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



Corolla deeply divided into four strap-shaped wavy wide-spreading petals. Stamens 

 two, hypogynous, the filaments twice as long as the petals. Flowers apparently 

 perfect, but functionally behaving as if distinctly staminate and pistillate. Fruit 

 compressed, with a terminal flat obovate-linear wing, blunt or emarginate at the 

 apex. 



Identification 



In summer the tree is readily distinguished by its smooth bark and stalked 

 leaflets showing the characters just enumerated. In winter the twigs show a slight 

 pubescence towards the apex and a ring of hairs at the base of the shoot. Leaf- 

 scars parallel to the twig on projecting leaf-cushions, semi-orbicular to crescentic, 

 the ends of the horns truncate, marked on the surface with a curved row of separate 

 bundle scars. Terminal bud large, greyish to greyish brown, ovoid, four- sided, 

 rounded (rarely acute) at the apex, the two outer scales gaping above and densely 

 pubescent. Lateral buds smaller, densely pubescent, arising from the twigs at a 

 wide angle. 



Varieties 



Fraxinus Ornus, occurring over a wide area, both as a wild tree in forests, and 

 cultivated in sunny arid regions, as in Sicily, shows considerable variation in the 

 size, shape, and texture of the leaflets ; and several varieties have been established.^ 

 The only one of those which is truly distinct is var. argentea, Grenier et Godron,* 

 a remarkable form, growing wild in the forests of Corsica and Sardinia, distinguished 

 by the leaflets being silvery white beneath, firm in texture, crenulate-serrate, usually 

 smaller than the type, often subsessile, though stalked leaflets also occur on the 

 same branch, ovate or oval in outline, occasionally approximating to an orbicular 

 shape. This singular variety has been made a distinct species ; * but modern French 

 and Italian botanists regard it as only a peculiar geographical variety, which seems to 

 be sporadic in forests where the type is also met with. 



Aiton * and Willdenow ^ described, as the true manna ash, F. rotundifolia, with 

 broad ovate or almost orbicular, deeply serrate leaflets. Willdenow's figure of the 

 foliage corresponds with the ash which I have described (p. 866) as F. excelsior^ var. 

 rotundifolia, and it is possible that both he and Aiton were in error in considering 

 their plant to have flowers like those of F. Ornus. 



Lamarck's® Fraxinus rotundifolia, differs, according to the description, from 

 Aiton and Willdenow's species of the same name, and is considered by Wenzig ^ and 

 Lingelsheim * to be F. Ornus, var. rotundifolia ; but is kept up by Koehne * as a 

 distinct species. Hanbury^" states that the manna ash cultivated in Sicily shows 



' Fiori et Paoletti, Flora Analitica d'ltaUa, ii. 341, mention, besides the typical form, var. rotundifolia with broad 

 elliptical leaflets, and var. lanceolata with lanceolate leaflets. 



2 Flore de France, ii. 473 (1850). 3 Fraxinus argentea, Loiseleur, Flora Gallica, ii. 697 (1806). 



* Hort. Kew, iii. 445 (1789). 



5 Berlin. Baumzucht, 116, fig. vi. i (1796). The figure was copied by Loudon, Arb. et Frut. Brit. ii. 1244 (1838), 

 who merely repeats Willdenow's description, and was probably unacquainted with the tree. 



8 Encycl. ii. 546 (1786). 7 In Engler, Bot. Jahrb. iv. 169 (1883). « Ibid. xl. 212 {1907). 



» Deutsche Dendrologie, 508 (1893). 10 ScUnce Papers, 368 (1876). 



